STANDARD 2 Teachers – Important September updates

Hi XXXX,

Just a quick update on the STD2 database and features for your reference (and exploration):

Past HSC questions (with the exception of 2010) made it clear whether daily credit card interest was to be calculated using simple/flat interest or compounding daily interest.
Any flat/simple interest credit card examples have now been rewritten as compounding interest questions.
Compounding daily credit card interest was covered in the 2020 HSC CRS (Q42, 2019 HSC), although we have updated the revision set on this topic to provide more practice using daily compounding.

Subcategory filters are now fully integrated into STD2. My experience in developing this new feature is that they are incredibly useful.
My Analogy: good study summaries require students to categorise their knowledge, a process that inevitably leads to valuable and sometimes profound topic insights.
Similarly, in the process of categorising the past HSC questions at a much more granular level than ever before, I saw nearly every topic area in a sharper light. The instantaneous snapshots of past HSC questions from multiple perspectives, at a click, will provide a valuable teaching tool for many.
If you haven’t been exploring and kicking the tyres of this new feature, I high recommend you do!

Now fully available and downloadable for Silver subscribers. This revision set is around 30% shorter than the earlier released HSC Comprehensive Revision Series.
If students who have completed the CRS are very keen, we have chosen different revision examples where practicable in the Final Stretch revision so that they can use this as further revision. Any overlap should be seen positively as an opportunity to hard wire the structure of worked solutions and developing speed, in our view.

2020 is the inaugural year of common testing between the Standard 2 and Advanced courses. Maths teachers across NSW I have spoken to have expressed great interest in how this plays out.
SmarterMaths has now introduced common content “paperclip” icons that appear at the end of question titles where STD2 and Advanced Maths have a common syllabus.
An implicit message of this icon should be that STD2 questions could be examined at a high degree of difficulty in the relevant topic area.
A great example of this potential difficulty uptick is Financial Maths, STD2 F5 2019 HSC 42 which required a deeper level in the understanding of Annuities last year (albeit before the new Advanced syllabus).

Thanks for subscribing!